Purl Crochet

In 2002, we moved to London. I suddenly had much time on my hands and worked a lot of crochet. At some point, I sat there staring at my work and thinking that the horizontal lines just didn't do it justice. In traditional crochet, each pair of lines worked is shown as a joined horizontal stripe. I chose to figure out how to reverse every other line to come up with a smoother texture on one side and individual line-stripes on the opposite.

With a little practice, I came to be able to make garments with the new technique. Today, I'm beginning swatching for a sweater for AJ for her fourth birthday next month. Ben was kind enough to take some pictures over my shoulder to get a good image of just how I changed how I make the stitch.

Purl Crochet VidClip (click will take you to comment page, click again on video link, let load, watch...)
(Note: KnicKnac at crochetville uploaded this to her photobucket, so if you can't see the original, try this link: PurlCrochetVid2)

A typical pattern has a stitch to row gauge of 4:5 (which I can never get!). In this method of crochet, I get a row gauge of 8:9 (note: results may vary, practice and gauge swatches are helpful!). Obviously, this can mess with a garment's outcome! I feel that often in crochet the row gauge is more important (as long as a pattern stitch worked can be made correctly when you add more stitches in width) because at such places as necklines, etc, the patterns often call for decreasing on every row.

The problem of st/row gauge also presents the issue of yarn size. I have a pattern for a sweater that calls for DK yarn and size US8H hook. With this hook, I can meet the 16st/4inch, but my row gauge is 18 instead of 20 rows/4in. I have two options: a) use a smaller hook until I get row gauge, or b) use a smaller yarn. The first option will lead to a denser fabric which won't have the drape the pattern maker showed. The second option will give the drape and get you to the row gauge needed, but will call for you to increase the # of stitches for the width of the finished garment to come out right -which isn't that hard to just right on the page (so many stitches) added per row.

Note: Esther reminded me of two other things 'purling' crochet does: 1) Use the 'back' side for color work (it comes out much nicer), and 2) the edges DO NOT curl. This I've been taking for granted these last few years!